


Never Fade Away

by kittybread



Category: Cyberpunk 2077 (Video Game)
Genre: Adult Content, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Friendship/Love, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:01:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28255074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kittybread/pseuds/kittybread
Summary: Maybe in being haunted by a digital ghost you lose your mind a bit, but boy, do you find your soul.
Relationships: Johnny Silverhand & V, Johnny Silverhand/Female V
Comments: 4
Kudos: 129





	Never Fade Away

**Author's Note:**

> I haven’t written a fanfiction in 5 years :’)) but i ended up loving mr silverhand soo here we go

The only thing this irrelevant merc's ever done in her life is relish in the past.

You know how people always talk about the old days? Mama Welles telling people stories about how "invincible" Jackie was, the Mox girls reminiscing at how the golden days were when Lizzie was still alive, Barry from next door pouring his heart out into citing the past with his old man... that was V. Always looking behind her. No matter what she did, the future was always out to ricochet heartbreak along the walls of her life.

So, the past was all she had.

"How long're you gonna stare at those keys?" the malware grumbled, head leaning against the brick wall beside Jackie's garage. V wiped her wet nose against her sleeve and breathed out in clogged gasps, eyes swollen to a brilliant red. She couldn't earn a moment alone even if she wanted to. She didn't want to make the ofrenda any more difficult on Mama Welles or on Misty, so she left the bar. That was his mother and the love of his life — V was just another choom. Why would she cry about him? No way will anyone see her like this... except for Johnny. Annoying.

"Fuck off," V said back to the virus, hiccuping midway. She rest her forearms onto her knees and stared ahead. "Not like you know how I'm feeling."

Johnny took the cigarette out of his mouth, something he apparently did to cope that there wasn't any nicotine in his host's system. "I don't have a choice. For a streetkid in Night City, you're disgustingly personal."

She shook her head, unable to retort in fear her emotions would spill out again. And if that happened, she didn't doubt Johnny would use that to shit on her in a heartbeat. Not like that insufferable malware would actually manage to ruin her ego, it's just something she didn't feel like defending herself about. 

"Whatever," she muttered, "I'm going home." Then she stood up, dusted herself off, and began hauling Jackie's Arch from his garage — quietly snivelling as she did so. 

V remembered when dear Jackster first bought this bike. He always made fun of her for not being able to ride, so he taught her, claiming he took her motorcycle virginity. Fucked up her arm the day of after crashing into the back alley of El Coyote Cojo and Mama Welles had to pay for the damage.

Johnny appeared on the other end of the bike, yanking V away from her memory. "You little gonk, do you realize how many shots you've had at the funeral?"

"What? Don't pretend like you give a fuck about me, Johnny."

"You're right, I don't care about you. You're pathetic. But unfortunately this is my body too and I'm not going to babysit a bitch who's heartbroken over her childhood choom. Take the bus or some shit to Watson."

She huffed, continuing to wheel the bike out. "Piss off, I'll be fine. I'm sure you drove drunk all the fuckin' time while you were alive."

"I did, but you're a depressed little shit right now. Impulsive, stupid, moody. One intrusive thought and you're rolling over the car hood, bloody face planted in some poor fool's windshield."

"Johnny I'm sad, not suicidal. Why are you so concerned with this? It's not like you'll feel the pain of rocketing into three-thousand pounds of metal." 

She finally stopped trying to hop on the bike and instead leaned against it, involuntarily hearing what Johnny had to say. "You're so dense. I have another chance at life to destroy a limb of a megacorp and some dumbfuck host ruins that opportunity because she flatlined underneath some wheels after drinking? Not a chance. And besides, if anyone were to kill you, it'd be me."

"Oh no, you failed to destroy Arasaka and now you fail to kill me yourself..." she replied tiredly. V trailed off in her retorts and sighed. It's no use fighting with him. Johnny's a sore loser when he doesn't get what he wants and she wasn't in the mood to argue. She pat Jackie's prized possession... another time. "Fine. I'm calling Delemain. Waiting for the bus in Heywood would be a death trap."

Conversations with Johnny usually went like this, but it didn't make it any less irritating. They bicker, tell each other to fuck off, move on. Nothing like her friendship with Jack. Even if it's only been six months, it felt like she's known him since childhood. Hell, even his mom treated her like her own...

"And while you're waiting for your taxi..." Johnny chipped in beside her, "...a cigarette might make you feel better."

The merc furrowed her eyebrows, mouth ajar. "Ugh, Johnny! Don't try to use my grief to manipulate me into smoking for you." 

"I mean... is it working?"

She ignored his smugness and popped a cigarette in her mouth, averting her eyes away from his victory stare. Her hiccups were fading to heavy breaths, so she supposed a cig would calm her down a little. Trying to sneak a little crying session by yourself takes a lotta energy away.

In the midst of her fishing for her lighter, Johnny managed to steal a glance of the pack of cigarettes. "Fields of Green, huh. Noticed you like the pussy flavors. I'm not surprised, though. You mix Cirrus Cola with Papa Garcin."

"Can you stop judging everything I do? Keep complaining and I'm going back in the bar to get shitfaced. There isn't anything wrong with liking the fruity drinks."

Johnny put his hands up in defense, mocking her as she pressed onto the starkwheel to the butt of the cigarette. For a moment there, she thought she saw Johnny a little less on edge when she inhaled the fumes. Him relaxing his shoulders is a detail she wouldn't miss after spending too much time with someone who always has a stick up his ass.

After finishing her smoke, Delemain pulled into the alleyway and gave her a few honks. "Thank you for choosing Delemain services. Evening, Miss V. Where would you like to go?"

" Hey, Del..." she greeted drowsily, crouching to the backseat and immediately sighing, resting her head on the back of her seat. New car smell. "My apartment in Little China. Drop me off at the front of Megabuilding H10."

"Yes ma'am," the AI said, rolling the car out of the alley. "My condolences. You have had a rough morning. Sleep on the way, Miss. I will wake you when we have arrived to your building."

"Thanks."

***

"Hello, Miss V. We have arrived at your apartment complex. Due to Mr. Welles' misfortune, your fee has been taken care of, courtesy of yours truly. I am not capable of sharing your grief but I did enjoy Mr. Welles' presence before his passing. A humorous character, he was."

V stretched in the backseat with the minimal room she had and opened the door mid-yawn. "Heh. Yeah, he was. Alright. See you soon, Del. Thanks again."

Stepping out of the cab, she had forgotten how desolate and calm her previous environment was as she was swarmed with a wave of people and other miasmal stenches that made Night City feel like the chaotic home it was. V shut the door behind her and sauntered up the steps.

Oh, the trashy, piss smell of V's apartment building. Such a difference compared to Delemain's air-freshened taxi. Food here's authentic but it's hardly appetizing when someone takes a shit on the corner of the street because all the public bathrooms have been trashed for the fifth time this week... and it's only been two days. In an attempt to get the streets smelling a little nicer, city officials have been trying to street-clean by making drones spray vinegar on the sidewalks. And while it has made a difference with the ammonia smell, those gonks always forgot to dilute the vinegar and now Little China has been smelling just as awful.

"Jesus V, if you wanna eat Chinese then take it to go. Stop starin'. Get out of this place."

V glanced over to Johnny with the same reflecting eyes that went over Jackie's motorcycle. He didn't know her connection to this particular food stall, but he got the gist of it and groaned. "Don't be like that, Johnny," V muttered, clearly tired of the malware being tired of V being tired of seeing Jackie everywhere and... you get the point. "This is where Jackie and I had our last meal." 

"I hope you aren't gonna start stress-eating because you're too sentimental."

V huffed through her nose. If only they never agreed to take Dex's gig. The duo would still be small time mercs but at least her buddy would still be alive. "Can't you just let me inner monologue? I'm grieving here," V told him as she snaked through the crowds of rush hour.

Johnny waved her off, "Oh of course, no problem. I'll monologue for you."

"Please don't."

The bustling crowd within the square was suffocating and Johnny didn't make it any better as he began walking beside her instead of staying in her head, disappearing and reappearing as people walked right through him. She usually ignored the digital ghost as his code took form onto a chair or against a wall, but it was a little difficult when he was narrating her every move. But... for some reason, it felt like he was using this vexing opportunity to get her mind off of Jackie... while talking about Jackie, except in a weird, lighthearted way. Suppose it worked, because instead of thinking about the memories held in this building, her mind was focused on ignoring Johnny's disturbing storytelling.

"She longingly gazed to the gym, yearning for the day that she could go back to watching the sweat drip down Jackster's sharp, shiny biceps," the biochip's prisoner began, "but his powerlifting form, oh, was it atrocious. The grieving V knew that Johnny's hot, impressive body was more stunning, though..."

V rolled her eyes. Jackie and herself never had the time to work out and he was always too tired after gigs to properly use the dumbbells. Legs were always sore after successful stealth missions that they just ate at Mama Welles' place and knocked out on the couch while Misty was astral projecting on mugwort or something. Simple times.

V strolled into the elevator and kept her eyes on the many TV's that accompanied the two. "While lost in her train of thought," Johnny continued, "she relived the times of dear Jackie Welles — his awfully trimmed samurai haircut, his unhealthy love for eating out after doing particularly nothing, his many layers of clothing that made him broader than he actually was..."

Ding. Here's her floor. V's deadpan expression remained plastered, ignoring the rockerboy.

"But alas..." the virus proclaimed, animated as he walked. "The poor, somber soul of V was left forlorn without her amigo, fingers trembling as she unlocked her door to see nobody waiting for her at home because she's annoying... and unlikeable. What a surprise."

V slid the door open and threw her backpack onto the floor. "Sounds like someone I know," she grumbled, heading straight for the terminal. "You can stop with your fanfiction, now. I'll stop venting about Jackie. Happy?"

"I'm never happy."

The girl clicked her tongue. "Alriiight, edgelord." She scrolled through her messages, shoulders completely sinking once she hovered over a notice from her building's administration. Meanwhile, Johnny was wandering about, drudging his shoes across the floor like a horrendously bored roommate. 

"I have a right to be edgy when I have a half-brained gonk as my host. We've done absolutely nothing the past week. You're boring." He stepped towards her and looked over her shoulder, the stench of tobacco emanating from his skin; a smell that only her brain could process. "And broke," he added upon seeing her overdue rent.

V quickly exited from her eviction warning and slid to the ground, head leaning against the wall. "Thank you... for emphasizing." She sighed, burying her face into her palms with Johnny standing above her. "What am I going to do... I still need to pay back Vik..."

"Are you always this pathetic?"

"Johnny, I'm really not in the mood to fight with you today. Go on a tantrum about killing me later."

Johnny puffed out smoke into her direction. "As I thought. You've got nothing to you. You just mope around all day and eat burritos and ramen. Shoulda just let you drunk drive to Arasaka with a bomb strapped to you so I could get this overwith. Kill two birds with one stone."

"Listen," V hissed, voice muffled through her hands. She spread her hands to her nose to see Johnny through the slits of her fingers. "The only choom I ever cared about is dead, I'm broke, rent's going up while I have a debt to pay, and I'm fucking dying because of some shitty terrorist in my head. Every time you fucking speak it feels like you dropped nukes in my brain like you bombed Arasaka. I haven't showered in four days because of you!"

"It's been five —" Johnny corrected, but V continued her rant.

"Do you know how violating it feels to have someone constantly watch you? Do you know how irritating it is to see that goddamn relic malfunction warning every time I wake up? It's annoying as shit! I can't even— "

"Shut your mouth already, I get it— "

"I'm not finished," V snapped, "I can't even sleep because of your fucking nicotine addiction. Maybe if you weren't waking me up in the middle of the night then maybe I'd have a lot more energy to do shit!" She ripped her hands off her face and glared at the rockerboy. "Just leave me the fuck alone. Smasher should've left your body where it was. Can't believe they wasted the preem technology on a failed rebel who never had a chance of making a difference in the first place."

This was the first time Johnny blew a fuse with V. Usually, she'd make a small retort, throw something at him, or ignore him entirely. She was surprisingly patient, completely opposite of him. In a way, when she did finally make her outburst, it reminded him of himself. Him spewing insults aimed for the soul, was exactly his style. He just couldn't figure out whether it was the relic beginning to enforce some of Johnny's quirks or they were a lot more alike than he'd thought. "So you do have some spark in you," Johnny observed, cigarette hanging between his two fingers. He decided to ignore her last statements; given her circumstances, he probably would've said worse. "You got a little loud there. You keep forgetting you don't have to speak out loud to me."

"I don't give a shit! Fuck. Off!" V hissed, continuing to speak out loud as if he wasn't a construct in her mind. Her eyes flickered to his cigarette and before he realized her intention, she had already snatched it and chucked it across the room. Once it hit the ground, it seemed to glitch and disappear through the wall. "Not even real," she chuckled languidly. "And you say I'm pathetic."

"Are you done?" he asked in his naturally blasé tone.

V took a deep breath. It was no use. Wasn't like he could just get up and walk away out of her head and God knows both of them yearn for that very thing. She was the only one that Johnny could get angry at and vice versa. They unfortunately only had each other. "Yes," the merc muttered, staying on the unswept ground.

"Then get up and shower. You smell like a sweaty reality junkie in Lizzie's Club and I'm sick of it." Immediately, Johnny took out a pack of his never-ending cigarettes and lit it inside the apartment, unaware (or most likely uncaring) that V was the only one that could suffocate in the coded smell of smoke. "God, can't believe I'm babysitting another depressed sack of shit."

V grimaced, waving the smoke out of her path. "Another? You? Taking care of someone? No. You only care about yourself."

"I do. So..." Johnny trailed off, leaving V to furrow her eyebrows. "No no no... chamomile tea, new comforters, ramen... those are your memories. I don't drink tea."

"Ah... you're thinking of me taking care of someone I briefly met in Atlanta," V explained, gradually calming down. Of all the memories that could rise, the little ones came to Johnny. "Chamomile tea is my favourite herbal tea that I can barely find anymore and it's expensive to import it." She sighed. "I should've brought some with me when I left Atlanta." At this point, she wasn't even talking to Johnny anymore. Just reminiscing. Georgia was a nice place, but V always turned to what she knew most: Night City.

Johnny was aware she began to ramble and for once, allowed her to do so. She might've been the softest goddamn merc in Night City. Didn't even flatline anyone she snuck up on — just knocked them out and threw them in the dumpster. Why would she go through all the trouble of giving someone her favorite tea that's so difficult to find and buy them new blankets when she barely had any money? Just because her friend is depressed? Johnny could never. If anything, he saw V as someone who'd stare down the barrel of a gun and thank the person behind it for giving her a quick death. 

Okay, that was an exaggeration. V was capable and knew how to get down to business, but she always had her head in the clouds. How she managed to get this far was beyond him.

In the end, they were forced together. V's choomba is dead and she feels stuck. Johnny inhaled slowly, contemplating, eyes peering over to V. She had her head laying to the side on her forearms, staring off into the window across the room. "Look, kid," Johnny began. V ignored him, but listened in. "You stink. Badly. Take the pills the little witch gave you and I'll be out of your hair for a bit. Take a shit, shower, masturbate, do whatever you gotta do before I check in again. Won't be much, but you'll have enough privacy."

V's head gently perked up. "What?"

"I'm not gonna repeat myself."

She wasted no time. V stood up and stepped into the bathroom, red and blue pill bottles sitting beside the sink.

"What are you doing?" Johnny sighed after she took a suspicious look at him and held the Omega Blockers close to her chest.

V squinted. "Making sure you don't try to knock these out of my hand so it lands in the toilet."

The malware groaned. "I do one thing out of character... never again— "

"Okay, okay, I'm taking them," V said as she opened the bottlecap. She returned to the restroom, taking a good look at herself. "Ha. I really do need a shower."

"No shit."

The merc poured the pills into her palm, taking a heavy breath. "I never should've gone to that funeral. It messed me up big-time, and now I'll miss him more than ever."

"And you're telling me this because?"

V turned her head to Johnny, who had his shoulder against the doorframe. "Because I'm gonna take these pills. After I vent to you, I don't need to here you complain about me when you're outta my head for a bit." She lift her hand to her mouth. "Here goes— "

"Wait," Johnny interrupted. He pulled off his aviators, revealing the complex and troublesome history beneath his eyes. "Look. I don't usually give advice, but... fuck it, here goes. Don't make the same mistake I made — say goodbye to the people you love. You know what I mean, right? Jackie Welles was your best choom, and you don't find a lot of straight-up peeps like that in NC. Best thing you can is remember them. Oh, and one more thing, if anyone asks I didn't just say all that to you. Got it?"

V nodded, lips slightly curving to a hidden smile. "Got it."

"Good. Now take those pills."

Huh. Never saw this side of Johnny before. Whether it was for personal gain or he was forcing himself to be considerate, V felt better nonetheless.

The pills washed down her throat. Johnny stepped out, and when she looked over the doorframe, he was gone.

She'll better herself and become a legend. For Jackie.


End file.
